goenka is in line with whatever he says he's in line with, and if you disagree or read or discuss anything that might say otherwise, then you can stop going to their centers and retreats (in a nutshell). if you go beyond 8th jhana you enter the deathless, as it were. i think this is what he's referring to in a certain sense.

Just keep breathing in and out like this. Don't be interested in anything else. It doesn't matter even if someone is standing on their head with their ass in the air. Don't pay it any attention. Just stay with the in-breath and the out-breath. Concentrate your awareness on the breath. Just keep doing it. http://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Just_Do_It_1_2.php

There are four jhanas then the four formless realms, followed by Nirodha-Samāpatti. Since they occur in succession one after another, it is typically called the 9 jhanas in Commentarial and scholarly literature.

maybe it makes sense to compare this statement with commentaries and subcommentaries. i don't see (from the suttas) how the deathless could be positively described as a jhana.

Just keep breathing in and out like this. Don't be interested in anything else. It doesn't matter even if someone is standing on their head with their ass in the air. Don't pay it any attention. Just stay with the in-breath and the out-breath. Concentrate your awareness on the breath. Just keep doing it. http://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Just_Do_It_1_2.php

convivium wrote:maybe it makes sense to compare this statement with commentaries and subcommentaries. i don't see (from the suttas) how the deathless could be positively described as a jhana.

Nirodha-Samāpatti (9th jhana) does not necessarily lead to full-enlightenment, although it is said to be very close, if one is an anagami and attains this state. One must already be an anagami or arahant to attain Nirodha-Samāpatti.

I may be interpreting it wrong but Goenka says that vipassana is the ninth jhana, not that the ninth jhana is vipassana. I think the only intended meaning of this is that vipassana is more important than all the jhanas. But I'm not sure, as I've heard this a long time ago.

He turns his mind away from those phenomena, and having done so, inclines his mind to the property of deathlessness: 'This is peace, this is exquisite — the resolution of all fabrications; the relinquishment of all acquisitions; the ending of craving; dispassion; cessation; Unbinding.' (Jhana Sutta - Thanissaro Bhikkhu translation)

For Theravada specifically in stream-enterer till arahat - it is defined as the ninth jhana

http://courses.dhamma.org/en/schedules/schabhaSatipatthana Sutta Courses have the same timetable and discipline as 10-day course. The difference is that in the taped evening discourses the Satipatthana Sutta is carefully examined. This is the principal text in which the technique of Vipassana is systematically explained. These courses are open to serious old students who have sat (not including courses served) at least three 10-day courses, have not been practising any other meditation techniques since last 10-day course, have been practising this technique of Vipassana for at least one year, and who are trying to maintain their meditation practice and the five precepts in their daily lives, at the very minimum from the time of applying to the course.

To become vegetarian is to step into the stream which leads to nirvana.If you light a lamp for somebody, it will also brighten your path. He who experiences the unity of life sees his own Self in all beings, and all beings in his own Self.